


Like a Rose

by semperama



Series: Tumblr Ficlets - Pinto [12]
Category: Star Trek RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Regency, Forbidden Love, M/M, Regency Romance, Sneaking Around
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-15
Updated: 2016-06-15
Packaged: 2018-12-01 08:03:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11482131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/semperama/pseuds/semperama
Summary: Mr. Quinto finds Chris in the garden.





	Like a Rose

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the rare word prompt "phoenigm: reddening of the skin."

Chris stops digging in the dirt at the sound of someone clearing their throat behind him. He looks around, then scrambles to his feet when he sees Zach— _Mr. Quinto_ —standing there. Mr. Quinto's hands are clasped behind his back and his eyes glint with amusement, forcing Chris to recall the previous afternoon, out by the greenhouse, when he had been wearing much the same expression before he leaned in and pressed his lips to the skin of Chris’s neck.

“You have done magic with the roses, Christopher,” Mr. Quinto says, reaching past Chris to cup one of the blooms in his palm. Chris turns his head to watch as Mr. Quinto’s thumb brushes gently across the petals, and that recalls sense memories too, his fingers on Chris’s lips, his hand cupping the side of Chris’s face.

Chris tries to push the memories away. It can never happen again. For one, Mr. Quinto is his employer. His family has been serving the Quinto family for generations, in one capacity or another. Somewhere, at this moment, his sister is probably taking laundry off the line, and his mother is putting the kettle on for afternoon tea, which Mr. Quinto will take in the parlor with his upper class peers—including that Miss Eve, who rumors say Mr. Quinto has been courting.

Which is the second problem. If anyone finds out about the dalliance by the greenhouse, they will both be disgraced, at best. Chris would find himself at the mercy of the law. Whatever that was, whatever brief moment of weakness, it is over now, and they must pretend it never happened.

“Thank you, sir,” he says, carefully avoiding Mr. Quinto’s eyes.

“I believe I requested that you call me Zach.”

“I cannot—”

Suddenly there is a hand at Chris’s waist, drawing him forward and compelling him to look up at Zach’s face. Zach’s eyes are dark now, but no less amused. He leans close, and Chris makes a small sound of protest, alarmed by how exposed they are. Someone could walk down the garden path at any moment.

“Zach,” he whispers.

“Ahh, that is better,” Zach says. His thumb caresses Chris’s cheek in the same way that it caressed the rose petals a moment ago. “How pink your skin gets. You are like a rose yourself, aren’t you?”

Chris’s face gets hotter at that, hotter with each pass of Zach’s thumb.

“Would it burn me if I kissed you now?” Zach wonders aloud, then leans in to press his lips to Chris’s cheek. He groans low in his throat, like the taste of Chris’s skin is unbearably sweet, and Chris gasps to hear it. The flush spreads down his neck and grows hotter still. Another moment of this and he might burst into flame.

“Zach,” he says again. Even saying his name feels illicit. 

“Meet me back here after dark,” Zach says as he steps away again, his voice rough and conspiratorial in a way that sends shivers skittering down Chris’s spine. He looks flushed himself, though it may be a trick of the light; Chris doesn’t get a chance to look long before Zach is turning away. And as Chris watches him walk back down the path, he thinks he would not have had the strength to argue anyway.


End file.
